Five
Exercises You MUST Avoid If You Want To Stay Injury-Free
These exercises are commonly seen yet, if you
do them, you stand a good chance of hurting yourself.
Find out what they are and why they can injure
you.
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All
exercises are not created equal. Some exercises are
good, some exercises are great, and some exercises are
an injury just waiting to happen. Knowing which exercises
to avoid can save you many months if not years of pain
and frustration.
1. Upright Rows
The
Upright Row exercise is done to develop the shoulders
and traps. Holding a barbell or dumbells in front of
your with a close, overhand grip, you pull the weight
up to your chest, keeping it close to your body, leading
with your elbows.
The
Upright Row is one of the most harmful exercises you
can expose your shoulders to. The problem with the exercise
lies in the position your arms must be in in order to
perform the movement. This position is called "internal
rotation." To demonstrate internal rotation, hold
your arms straight out to the sides with your palms
down. Now rotate your hands forward as if you were pouring
out a glass of water in each. To do the upright row,
the arms are bent at the elbow then internally rotated.
Internal
rotation itself is not necessarily bad for your shoulders.
The problem comes when you raise the arms up and add
resistance in that position. Every time you raise the
weight, a small tendon in your shoulder gets pinched
(known as impingement) by the bones in the shoulder.
This may not hurt immediately; it may not even hurt
for a long, long time. The problem is the tendon will
gradually become worn down and damaged. You may not
even know you have a problem until one day the tendon
snaps!
Instead
of upright rows, stick to exercises such as dumbell
presses, military presses and various raises. They are
far safer for the shoulders.
2. Behind-The-Neck Pulldowns
This
exercise is done to work the muscles of the back. While
the exercise itself is actually effective for working
the back, the problem with the exercise lies in what
it can do to your shoulders.
In
the previous exercise, I talked about internal rotation
of the shoulders. The problem with the behind-the-neck
pulldown lies in "external rotation." Going
back to the arms out to the side example, instead of
pouring water forward, rotate your arms backward so
that your palms are facing up. It's basically the opposite
movement to internal rotation.
To
do the behind-the-neck pulldown as normally instructed,
you must externally rotate your shoulders as much as
possible. This is a very delicate position for your
shoulders. The supporting muscles of the shoulders (known
as the rotator cuff) are not in a good position to stabilize
the joint and injury to those supporting muscles can
result, which can lead to further injury in the connective
tissue of the joint.
On
top of that, since most people do not have enough shoulder
flexibility to get a straight line of pull behind the
neck, they must bend their neck forward to even do the
movement. This can result in neck strain on top of shoulder
strain.
This
information also applies to the behind-the-neck pull-up
exercise. The mechanics of the movement are exactly
the same, the only difference being you're pulling yourself
up instead of pulling the weight down.
Stick
to exercises that are in front of the body, such as
front pulldowns, close-grip pulldowns and pull-ups to
the front.
http://www.fitstep.com/Library/Exercises/Close_grip_pulldowns.htm
3. Behind-The-Neck Shoulder Presses
The
Behind-The-Neck Press gives us the same shoulder issues
associated with the Behind-The-Neck Pulldown. To do
the movement, you must maximally externally rotate the
shoulders. Again, this places the shoulders in a very
vulnerable position, which can easily result in strain
in the Rotator Cuff muscles.
Also,
as with the pulldowns, most people simply don't have
the necessary shoulder flexibility to get a straight
line on the movement - they must tilt their head forward
to get the bar behind it, adding greatly to the possibility
of injury.
Stick
to the military press and the dumbell press for your
shoulder pressing movements.
http://www.fitstep.com/Library/Exercises/Seated_db_shoulder_press.htm
4. Stiff-Legged Deadlifts On A Bench
The
Stiff-Legged Deadlift, properly done, is actually a
very good movement for the hamstrings, glutes and lower
back. The problem comes when, in an attempt to increase
the stretch on the hamstrings, the exercise is done
standing on a block or bench.
To
get the most stretch on the hamstrings and to protect
the lower back from injury, an arch should be maintained
in the lower back during the movement. It's extremely
difficult to maintain an arch in the lower back when
you are stretching down as far as you can towards the
floor with a barbell pulling you down.
Without
the arch, as a natural result, the spine will flex and
the supporting muscles of the spine will relax. This
places much of the tension of the exercise directly
on the connective tissue and bones of the spinal column
rather than the supporting muscles, which are stabilizing
the spine. In an effort to get more stretch on the hamstrings,
you instead compromise the support structures of your
lower back.
To
get more of a stretch on the hamstrings without standing
on a bench and compromising your lower back, click
here to have a look at the technique in action.
5. The Sit-Up
If
you enjoy having a pain-free lower back, the regular
floor sit-up is a good exercise to avoid. When you do
a sit-up, the mechanics of the movement and position
of your body throw much of the torque of the movement
onto your lower back. Your hip flexors pull directly
on your spine in order to raise your torso off the floor
when you do the exercise, leading to strain in the lower
back area.
To
top it off, the abdominal muscles (the real target of
the exercise) are only worked isometrically. This means
they don't actually contract and move, they just work
to hold the torso steady while the hip flexors do the
pulling. This is not a very effective abdominal exercise.
You
will be far better off performing direct abdominal-training
movements such as crunches, ball crunches, cable crunches,
etc. These exercises directly target the abs without
throwing excessive tension on the lower back.
http://www.fitstep.com/Library/Exercises/Crunches.htm
An
excellent exercise for the abdominals that is similar
in look to the regular sit-up but focuses on the abs
is the Abdominal Sit-Up. You
can read more about it by clicking here.
The exercises you do have a profound effect on your
training and your health. Be sure to choose exercises
that will help you move forward towards your goals and
not set you back through injury.
